


May Angels Lead You In (Hear You Me My Friend)

by Mauisse_Flowers



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Mummy Series, Thor (Movies), Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Ancient Egyptian Deities, Awesome Darcy Lewis, Darcy is the fandom bicycle and I love it, Egyptian Gods are Dicks, F/M, Gen, Major Character Death (and in the first chapter but they don't stay dead), Reincarnation, This isn't as fluffy as my other Darcy-su-namun fic, the afterlife
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-27
Updated: 2016-12-27
Packaged: 2018-09-12 16:59:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9081472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mauisse_Flowers/pseuds/Mauisse_Flowers
Summary: Loki is an asshole. Darcy dies and goes to the Afterlife. Darcy has to go through a lot of tests to get home, while yelling at gods who she actually is. Jane refuses to sit idle. That's pretty much this fic.





	1. May Angles Lead You In

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Darcy/Imhotep Thing](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/250939) by amusewithaview. 



There is a dark sky above her, with a bright sprinkling of stars, and Darcy has to think for a moment because she’s never seen so many. At least, not on Earth. She’s only seen that many when on Asgard with Jane, sitting with the stationary Heimdall and a (for Asgardians) small mug of warm ale, staring off into the gut-wrenching drop expanse of space as Jane learns the ropes of queenship. And Darcy knows she’s supposed to be there too, learning how to be a princess because Thor claimed her as his, with all it entails tacked on, but being royal makes her skin crawl in a way it shouldn’t, in a way it always has. (It’s why she never liked the typical Disney movies. _Tarzan, Mulan, Lilo and Sitch_ , and _Atlantis_ were hers. Always hers. And _Brave_ now too, despite Merida and Kida being princesses.)

Darcy gives a slow blink, wondering why the ground feels so grainy, so soft and easily giving under her fingers. She sits up, shuddering as sand escapes her hair and down her shirt, sticking to her arms and clothes and finding crevices she didn’t know until then. She stands, brushing off the sand and shaking out her top and jacket, bending to flip her hair and rigorously try to get the sand out. Then she stands tall, looking around with hands on her hips.

It’s cold as hell, and she’s glad to be in a jacket and ¾ sleeve top. She’s glad winter set in early in New York. That thought makes her wonder where the fuck she is. Because last she checked, Jane and her were going off on a Science! adventure. That brings back the flood of memories of Loki appearing suddenly in the center of the mountain road the van was on and causing them to crash, going down the side. She recalls her head snapping sideways against the window as it shatters and then waking up, hanging upside down and still buckled in. Her right arm hurt like crazy, entire left side aflame, and she subconsciously grabs where a large, metal pipe should be sticking through but isn’t now. Jane had looked relatively unscathed and was breathing heavily, still unconscious with a dripping head wound and what looked like a snapped wrist.

Then there was laughter, and Loki was there, using magic to force Jane awake. She began to panic and scream, and Darcy was using her other hand to try and get out and stop him. There was a lot of yelling, and Darcy cursing at him, and Jane promising Thor was going to show up and kick Loki’s ass, and a musing of, “Thor will need to know who’s taken you, little mortal,” as he pulls out a blade. Loki man-handling Jane around the front of the upturned vehicle she remembers vividly, as well as her heartbeat picking up painfully. Then he’s slamming Jane into the side of the car, teeth spread wide as his magic holds her down to free his hand. Darcy knows what’s about to happen, Jane too, and Jane is already screaming as Loki grabs Darcy’s hair and forces her to bare her throat. The pain and sob turned into a gurgle and everything going red and suddenly disappearing as Jane screeches and sobs and the cries of Darcy’s name get distant, gone with a sluggish _plip, plip_ of blood in her ears.

Darcy realizes she’s fallen to her knees, clutching at her throat so suddenly she almost misses the giant– size of a _muthafucking mammoth kind of giant_ – snake coming her way. She screams, trying to get to her feet and running in the opposite direction. The tail whips around and she thinks to jump just before it hits her. Her hands grab the tail before she can go flying, clinging onto it. It’s a giant rattler, she notices briefly before being subject to Hermione Granger On the Whomping Willow Treatment. She’s pretty sure it would bite her if that didn’t entail (heh) biting off its own tail and killing itself.

A hand slips from sweating too much and she goes flying. She slams into something squishy and goes skidding over the ground. She tumbled over whatever the squishy item is and strikes a jagged wall. She hacks and wheezes for breath as blood pools in her mouth, left arm numb and limp and also somehow hurting too. She wants to cry, and she does, but Darcy has to _get up_ , and she has to _go_. Darcy doesn’t care where, so long as it’s safe.

She looks up, sees the snake steadily getting nearer. Darcy keeps a hand on the stone wall and begins limping away. A loud sound of pain stops her, and she turns to see an elderly man, lying in pain on the ground, blood around him. She gasps, and moves to help him instead. He babbles at her in some language weakly, and she wishes she understood what he was saying. All she can do is shake her head and make him stand on wobbly knees. His arm is broken. And she knows it’s her fault.

“It’s okay, I’ll get you away from here and get your arm looked at. I’m so sorry about that, by the way. But let’s focus on the huge ass snake first.”

Of course they aren’t fast enough. Both are hurt and the man is older than Noah and his arc. The snake is on them in no time and, against her need to _abandon, flee, hide_ , she gets in front of the old man and crowds him against the wall, glaring up at the snake. And it just … stops. Stares at them, waiting. And it makes Darcy confused.

“Go away!” She shouts, but it’s looking past her at the old man now. She turns to look, and finds the injured old man is now a pretty, dark skinned woman in what looks likes a dress from _The Prince of Egypt_ , with a vulture headdress and a twisted reed staff. Stumbling back, even more confused and scared, she demands, “Who are you? Where am I?”

“I am the goddess Buto, and you have passed my test, Anck-su-namun.”

“Test? What test?” Darcy asks, feeling her hysteria steadily rising. “What is going on?! What is this place and why did you call me that? My name is Darcy Lewis, not A Knock Sue the Moon!”

The woman’s gaze turns stormy. “You do not recall the past deeds you have committed, and believe yourself to be this Darcy Lewis?”

“That is the name my mom put on the birth certificate, so I don’t know how it could be anything else,” Darcy’s voice wavers from blind pain. “Please, tell me what’s going on. The last thing I remember was having my–” she chokes on the words, then forces them out, “my throat slit by Loki.”

The woman says nothing, merely looks over Darcy in curiosity. Then she raises her staff. There is a sharp hiss and suddenly the snake behind Darcy lungs, shrinking as it does. Darcy screams, ducking, and when she lifts her head the snake is twined around the staff, staring at her with beady black eyes. She shivers.

“It is not my place to tell you things you must find yourself, Darcy Lewis.” Buto says, looking scaly suddenly, her eyes angry but also sympathetic. “But I promise you my protection as you traverse this land. Once you reach the hall of the gods, I hope you seek what you are here for.”

“Seek what I’m here for…?” Darcy shakes her head. The woman sprouts vulture wings from her back, and is decidedly snake scale green. Darcy ignores it, deciding it’s not the weirdest thing she could see in her life. “Buto, please! At least tell me where I am!”

“The Underworld.”

Darcy’s eyes widen in shock as Buto swings her staff against the wall, it hitting with a resounding clap. Darcy flinches away, rocks and boulders begin to fall and tumble to the ground. An archway appears, shimmering around the edges. “You must pass through this doorway to continue on your journey, Darcy Lewis.” She shifts then, into a giant, winged cobra with a red crown, and Darcy has to move back to keep from being hit by her sleek, black tail. From its fanged mouth come the words, “Not every god is as kind as I, Darcy Lewis. Be warned.”

With a single beat of her wings, Buto takes into the sky, leaving Darcy all alone, hand at her throat and on the verge of a breakdown. Her wounds healed as the breeze of Buto’s wings slid over her.


	2. Hear You Me (My Friend)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy meets an asshole

Buto is right. Not every god is kind, not every one goes easy on her or decides to speak English so she knows what’s going on. The only thing they all do the same is call her Anck-su-namun (Darcy Lewis, once she raises hell about the name) and pass her through a door or archway of some kind.

She’s desperately hungry and sports a broken arm when she finds a cave and huddles there, hoping to sleep for a little while before dealing with another god. Menthi, or she thinks that was his name, had forced her to fight him even as she told him repeatedly she didn’t know how. And she didn’t know how until sai were put into her hands. Somehow, suddenly, she fought back with knowledge she’d never gained. While she didn’t get him onto his back, she was able to win with just a broken arm and be passed on through his gate of rusted metal and green reeds.

Never in Darcy’s life had she fought with a weapon other than her taser, so she desperately wanted to know where the sudden knowledge and abilities had come from. They hadn’t come from her, and Buto hadn’t put anything like that in her. But she thought it probably had to do with this name they all called her until she got mad.

Warmth presses at the back of her eyes. She bites into her top lip to stop the oncoming sob. She shakes with cold and fear. This isn’t where Darcy wants to be. She wants to be with Jane, a tent pitched and watching the stars, cataloging the gleaming trail of falling stars (even Jane, for all her love of astronomy, couldn’t help but call them such and make a wish or two, and Darcy misses that) in a warm, conifer forest in the Canadian wilderness. Or teaching Thor and Steve about modern appliances (more like reacquainting with Thor) and sitting them down for show and movie marathons, giving them books full of so much nerd you’d be crazy to not know them. Even talking gossip with Natasha and Pepper and Jane and Betty and Helen over margaritas the first Friday of every month and her doing Yoga with Bruce and Pepper every Saturday. That is where Darcy wants to be. With friends and family and warmth and happiness.

Her mouth is forced open from a gasping sob, her chest and stomach seizing painfully, reminding her that she also won against Menthi with cracked ribs. A choked off cry of pain leaves her, face burying in her unbent elbow since she can’t pull up her knees without her vision blackening.

A scuffle sound comes from somewhere further in the cave, and Darcy panics. She can’t fight someone again, or win a game of wit, or run now. For all Darcy knows, she’ll die right here and never get out of the hellhole of an Underworld (and the fuck what kind of Underworld even was this? She was taught that you rode a boat and went to Elysium if good or Tartarus if bad. What the fuck happened to the boat? What happened to being judged by helping people and fighting for the good fight? She’d only stolen one Jolly Rancher when nine, dammit!)

A body steps from the shadows, and Darcy already has a hand up, saying, “Wait, wait, wait! Please don’t hurt me! I– I can’t fight! Please, don’t!”

A man is staring at her, skin bronzed from sun and bald as a newborn baby, only wearing a black, gold-lined _shendyt_. He’s white, the first white person she’s seen in Odin knows how long and it’s mind boggling. He looks at her with dark eyes full of rage, betrayal, wonderment and passion. She imagines she looks like shit, hair a mess and bloody and shaking in terror. He could do whatever he wanted right now and she couldn’t stop him, which is what really fucking sucked.

“ **Anck-su-namun, you have finally come to walk the Underworld.** ”

And she bristles. She’s in pain and terrified but she won’t die being called another name. Darcy bares her teeth at him, shouting, “For the last fucking time, my name is Darcy Elisabeth Lewis! I was born to Janet Marie Lewis without a dad and I will die Darcy Elisabeth Lewis! You can eat my ass if you don’t want to call me Darcy!”

He looks taken a back, then his eyes narrow. He kneels down before her. “ **Interesting. You look and act differently. You don’t seem to remember, either.** ” He hums, briefly. “ **I suppose I can take you to the hall of the gods. I am willing to face judgment now that you are returned. We may face oblivion together.** ”

He holds out a hand, Darcy still glaring at him. She wouldn’t take his hand even if she could. “I don’t know what you said, but that,” she nods to his hand, “is not touching me. Plus, I can’t even get up.”

Her eyes go to her broken arm, dropping to her ribs she’s now wrapped her arm around. Then she raises an eyebrow, matching his expression.

“ **Yes, you certainly are no longer her. You would have stood up anyway.** ”

“I feel you just compared me to this chick again,” Darcy frowns. “Quit it, you asshole.”

He frowns too. “ **I will heal you so we may go.** ” He reaches toward her, and Darcy jumps, pressing into the wall harder. “ **Calm, Darcy Lewis. I mean you no harm, My Lover.** ”

Darcy turns her head away, hands clenching as his fingers run down her arm. It glows with a dark light as he mumbles words, heat spreading up her arm. The pain seeps away and her arm suddenly no longer hurts or feels heavy. Darcy moves it, staring in shock. He reaches lower and Darcy snatches his wrist fast before he can touch her torso.

“What did you do?”

The man doesn’t reply, staring at her. Darcy frowns. “Why did you do that?” More silence. Darcy sighs. “… Thanks.”

His eyebrow quirks again, eyes dipping to where her other arm holds her ribs. Reluctantly, Darcy lets go. Then he sits back on his hunches, watching as whatever he did works, fixing any cracks or bruises made to her torso.

She swallows heavily after, unsure of what to make of this. Darcy looks at him, waiting for him to say something. When he doesn’t, she says, “What’s your name?”

He’s clearly fucking with her. The way he smiles says so. But he doesn’t say anything. “I’m Darcy. You?” She points to herself when she says her name, then him, feeling like a dumbass because he’s being an asshole.

“ **Imhotep** ,” he says, and stands to his full height, lowering a hand to her.

Darcy doesn’t take it. She uses the cave wall, wondering what he’s playing at but knowing he won’t answer if he wants to keep up the pretense of not speaking English. They stand there, staring at each other, awkward.

“I… have to go, Imhotep, dude.” Darcy says, inching toward the mouth of the cave. “I’m hungry and now that I’m better I can go work on getting my ass out of here faster. Uh, thanks again, dude, Imhotep.”

“ **Wait** ,” he follows her, and moves ahead to block her. “ **You will die with no protection. How have you lasted?** ” She’s staring at him, confused, and Imhotep closes his eyes, knowing he must keep in mind she does not remember their– or more accurately _his_ – love. So he turns his attention to her, searching for some sign of how. He finds it on the side of her throat. What looks like snake bites lie there, the sign of Buto’s protection, and Imhotep wonders how she achieved such, her having slighted the goddess with misuse of her creatures.

“Dude, if you aren’t going to come with, lemme pass. I don’t have time for this.”

She goes around him, heading out into sandy terrain, and Imhotep follows. The marks mean no god can kill her directly, and any trickery will fail. But terrible injury or poison are not off the table, like the injuries he just corrected.

“So you’re gonna follow me? Oookay.”

She finds the path she’d stepped onto, and begins to follow it. Imhotep takes up step beside her, watching her. “ **I am protecting you for my interest in us passing on together.** ”

“You need to speak English, dude. You’re so old you should know it. A couple of you guys do. I think all you gods do, most are just jerks and don’t want to. Like you.”

Imhotep smirks.

“What are you anyway? Some healer god? Did Buto send you? She’s the only one who was relatively nice to me.” Darcy asks, and he shakes his head, enjoying this version of Anck-su-namun. She was… certainly not pretty or fun, for him, but she did provide entertainment. He couldn’t wait for her to remember. Then she would be her true self in soul and body. “Then who are you?”

“ **Your former love** r,” he tells her, and she frowns, still not understanding.

“Are you a guide?” The look he gives her tells her that she’s partially wrong, but not completely. “Alright, then. I’ll just call you ‘Guide’ then.” He frowns at her. “I mean, you gave me your name but I think Guide is better.” She smiles at him, eyes closed as she tacks on, “Until you start speaking English, anyway.”

So that’s how she will play. In a manner of speaking, he did start it but not breaking down the barrier her locked memories provide. Imhotep wouldn’t now, for sake of seeing how long it would be before she remembered herself and they could pass on.

“Anyway, since you’re so stubborn on the 'I no speaky Englese,’ I’ll take the lead.”

And she does for all of five minutes before they encounter Neit, who demands she preform a weaving contest against the goddess. It was interesting watching the way Darcy got so enraged at being called Anck-su-namun. She very much wished to distance herself from who she once was.

“I don’t know how to weave,” Darcy admits to the goddess after calming, and Neit appears unimpressed. “But I do know how to knit and crochet. Can we do that instead?”

“I will make no concessions for such a brat,” Neit says, Darcy glares. “You will weave or you are stuck here until you learn to do so.”

“That could take months or years!” she cries, horrified.

“Then you had best learn quickly, Anck-su-namun.” Neit grins. “You will not hear your new name from me until then.”

And Darcy flinches. It’s the first time a god hasn’t started using her name after yelling at them. Darcy opens her mouth to show her what for, done with the bullshit these gods put her through, but Imhotep easily slides between them, agitating Darcy and annoying Neit.

He bows to the goddess. “ **Lady Neit, the loveliest of weavers and mystics, this Anck-su-namun has no knowledge of who she is. Only of Darcy Lewis. Knitting and crocheting are the modern weaving of her society. To make her show she knows an outdated form of survival is an insult to her and the family who taught her, as much as an insult to herself.** ”

Neit scoffs. “ **Your flattery does nothing for me, Imhotep. We immortals know what you have done to procure such a mindless wandering here, but** ,” and she hesitates, just a fraction, “I will put her to a test of knitting.” Her bright yellow eyes turn to Darcy, “If you fails, you may never pass me. Anck-su-namun has no second chance.”

Darcy’s hands clench. “Alright.”

After Darcy knits a doll, socks, and a cap before Neit, the goddess passes the two along with a, “You did well, Darcy Lewis.”

And Darcy smiles, “I learned from the best, my grandmama.”

Imhotep takes the lead after that, deciding he can avoid the harsher gods and persuade the easier ones. He has no reason to take these tests, cursed to wander alone unless he can convince the hall to let him pass on with Darcy into oblivion.

And with her here, he will not take no for an answer.


End file.
